Syria-Iraq fight gets a name: ‘Inherent Resolve’

WASHINGTON (AP) – It’s less punchy than previous nicknames for US conflicts in the Middle East – remember Operation Desert Storm and its thunderous attacks against Saddam Hussein? – but the Pentagon has finally named its fight against Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria: Operation Inherent Resolve.

The naming, which took weeks of deliberation behind closed doors at US Central Command and at the Pentagon, is part of an effort to organise a long-term military campaign.

But that name, Inherent Resolve.

Inherently bland.

It’s less awe-inspiring than other names chosen for US military operations in Iraq over the past two decades – Desert Shield, Desert Storm and Desert Fox, for example. It appears to convey the no-drama approach that marks President Barack Obama’s style.

In this Aug 8, 2014 file photo, an armoured vehicle belonging to Kurdish Peshmerga fighters rushes to a bombing site as smoke rises after airstrikes targeting Islamic State militants near the Khazer checkpoint outside of the city of Irbil in northern Iraq – AP

The staff of Army Gen Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made the final decision, said his spokesman, Col Ed Thomas. Thomas offered no details.

But Central Command, which is executing the campaign, took a stab at it.

“’Inherent Resolve’ is intended to reflect the unwavering resolve and deep commitment of the US and partner nations in the region and around the globe to eliminate the terrorist group ISIL and the threat they pose to Iraq, the region and the wider international community,” it said, using a common name for the Islamic State group.

There was no rush of enthusiastic praise, even at the Pentagon. Asked about the choice, the Pentagon press secretary, Rear Adm John Kirby, said US officials ran it by coalition partners and “there was general sense of approval of it.”

Military operations are routinely given official names, in part for administrative reasons.

But they are meant also to bolster public support and international credibility. The US-led effort to protect Kurds who fled their homes in northern Iraq in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War, for example, was called Operation Provide Comfort. A US military disaster relief mission in Bangladesh that same year was Operation Sea Angel. The US military’s effort against Ebola in West Africa is called Operation United Assistance. The name for the US role in an international air campaign in Libya in 2011 was Odyssey Dawn.

The practice of naming military operations goes back at least to World War II, when code names were assigned mainly to preserve security. The names were classified, unlike the nicknames of modern operations.

In a 1995 article in Parameters, a US Army War College academic journal, Gregory C Sieminski wrote that the Pentagon’s Vietnam-era guidelines for naming military operations cautioned against counterproductive name choices, specifying that they must not express “a degree of bellicosity inconsistent with traditional American ideals or current foreign policy” or convey “connotations offensive to good taste or derogatory to a particular group, sect or creed.”

There should be no fear that “Operation Inherent Resolve” is too bellicose.

Sieminski argued that careful naming of military operations can provide a public relations boost and help shape a war of images. “In that war, the operation name is the first – and quite possibly the decisive – bullet to be fired,” he wrote.

The naming of the current air campaign in Iraq and Syria comes as Obama and his military advisers wrestle with directing a coalition of partner nations toward a common goal: destroying the Islamic State group. It has been slow going thus far, with officials cautioning that it could drag on for years. The US has more than 1,400 military personnel in Iraq, mostly in Baghdad, but Obama has ruled out sending combat troops. The US says it has no troops in Syria.